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New briefs 12.03.03

Tools

RGRTA,
the Terminalator

Rochester
Central Station's proponents must think there are no speed bumps ahead for
the downtown bus terminal plan. But even as the December 15 deadline for public
comment approaches, the opposition is coming together.

Opponents of the plan have been
studying the project's draft environmental impact statement. (It's viewable at
the Rochester Central Library, 115 South Avenue; City Hall, 30 Church Street;
and the Rochester-Genesee Regional Transportation Authority offices, 1372 East
Main Street.) And they're not finding much to like.

That was made clear November 25 at a
public comment meeting at the Riverside Convention Center. Though we didn't
take a scientific headcount (thus putting ourselves in the same league as the
RGRTA, we guess), it seemed that 80 percent of the speakers were anti's.

Most of the pro's were
representatives of building trades unions that understandably want jobs for
their members. Most of the anti's were urban dwellers and downtown advocates.
People were coming and going, but more than 100 people were seated in the meeting
room at any one time. The speakers' roster ran to 50 names.

Heads of local organizations were
politely at odds. "We stand very strongly and firmly in support of this
project," said Heidi Zimmer-Meyer, president of the Rochester Downtown
Development Corporation. Zimmer-Meyer emphasized the station's link to economic
development: The station, she said, will "strengthen the fabric" of
downtown.

But Evan Lowenstein, director of the
Common Good Planning Center, said the project "begs a lot more
consideration of alternatives." He charged that Central Station planners
ignored a "plan to use the existing Sibley's Building" for bus-passenger
amenities. He also wondered about the planners' attitude toward some neglected
19th-century buildings at the northeast corner of Main and Clinton ---
buildings that would be demolished and could be replaced by a fancied office
tower. With attitudes like those underpinning the proposed station, he said,
"the Liberty Bell might have been tossed away because it had a crack in
it."

The opposition included several
members of the Rochester Raging Grannies, part of a US-Canada network that uses
music and pointed humor to promote social justice and peace. Member Vicki Ryder
took the podium, leading the Grannies in song: "Follow the money!... The
poor people take the hit," etc. The Grannies concluded that Central
Station will be "a diesel-spewing hoop-de-doo."

Bus patron Clay Harris, the only
African-American to speak during the first two hours of the meeting, made
perhaps the most trenchant remarks. "I believe there should be at least
two more of these hearings," he said. He acknowledged a need to "promote
and expand the economic base." But the project, he said, would bring only
"a short-term infusion of construction jobs." "Everything that
glitters is not gold," he said.

"The terminal will not have a
positive impact," Harris said. "It will not deal with the core issues
of why downtown is dying... What's needed is more people on downtown streets in
the days and evenings." Harris reminded planners that the skyway system
--- which drained life from the streets below --- had also been sold as a way
to revitalize downtown.

Peter Siegrist, director of
preservation services for the Landmark Society of Western New York, testified
at the meeting, as well. The Society, he told us later, wishes to see the
historic architectural continuity of Main Street preserved. Some components of
the plan worry the group, too: For example, there's the corner office tower,
which may or may not become a reality. If that tower never is built, said
Siegrist, "you'd get a windowless slab" facing toward the Sibley's
Building. Siegrist concedes that the old corner buildings are run down and not
on any official register. But that doesn't mean they're disposable: "They
still maintain that historic street wall," he says.

What happens now? Without guessing
at the timeframe, people close to the process say it will take a while for
government agencies to address issues raised by the DEIS and public comments.
And many objections on file are too substantial to ignore. Indeed, they include
concerns about air quality, bus-traffic flow, architectural integrity, downtown
preservation, and Transportation Planning 101. So it ain't over.

Health
of the mountains

The
Adirondack Council has released its State of the Park 2003 report, which
summarizes recent good and bad news about the Adirondack Park's six million
acres of public and private land.

Examples from the good side: The
report tells how Governor George Pataki moved to protect 10,000 wilderness
acres in the High Peaks region, in line with the Council's conservation agenda.
And the village of Lake George enacted "a village-wide ban on the use of
personal watercraft, a.k.a. jet skis." (Jet skis, says the report, make up
just 15 percent of watercraft on gorgeous Lake George but account for 50
percent of accidents there.)

From the bad side: According to
recent studies, the Park's sugar maples could be "acid rain's next big
victim." Acid deposition has already "contributed to the decline of
red spruce trees throughout the eastern US and sugar maples in central and
western Pennsylvania," the report says. And speaking of damage: The report
notes that a bill aimed at controlling all-terrain vehicles on public lands has
been idling in the state legislature.

The report is available from the
Adirondack Council, PO Box D-2, Elizabethtown, New York, 12932; it's also in
portable document format at www.adirondackcouncil.org.

Play
time

A
vignette from the Monroe County budget
talks:

After a mandatory two-hour meeting
last Wednesday, several Republican county legislators --- including Tracy
Logel, George Wiedemer, and Dennis Pelletier --- piled into the fourth-floor
elevator headed down to the lobby of the county office building.

The lone Democrat in the elevator
was minority leader Stephanie Aldersley.

The Republicans quickly circled
Aldersley, jokingly trying to strong-arm her into going along with their budget
plans.

Aldersley played along. "No sales
tax! No sales tax!" she screamed.

When the elevator doors opened,
Pelletier said it was too bad Democrat
and Chronicle reporter Jim Goodman wasn't waiting there. Still kidding,
Pelletier said the group could have fooled Goodman into thinking an agreement
had been reached on the way down. Given the speed of the elevators in the
county office building, that ain't impossible.

Cops
in schools

Some
heated comments from Republican county legislator Mike Hanna over a proposal to put an armed sheriff's deputy
in the Rush-Henrietta school district:

"I think the legislature made a huge
mistake in approving the funding," he says. "I just don't agree in principle
with having armed police officers in public schools."

Funding for the deputy is coming
mainly from a federal grant. The legislature last month approved the grant 22
to 6. All six opposed were Republicans: Mike and Sean Hanna, Bill Smith, Peter
McCann, Douglas Dobson, and Pieter Smeenk.

"People think this is an isolated
thing, and my view is that it's the beginning of something that is going in the
wrong direction," Mike Hanna says. "There will come a day when they'll be back
and they'll want another police officer. And they'll come a day when another
school district will come and want an armed police officer."

The request for the deputy, Hanna
says, is an admission of failure by the school district.

"It's obvious that the
administration of the school doesn't feel as though they have the ability to
solve the problems that face them, so they are going to outside law authority,"
he says. "And that's a shame."

The move is proactive, says M. Rick
Page, an assistant superintendent in the school district. It is not, he says, a
response to any problems the district might be having. School resource
officers, nationally, have been an effective form of community policing, he
says.

Half the officer's duties will be to
serve as a role model, Page says. Forty percent of his or her duties will be as
adjunct professor and teacher. The deputy will teach in driver's education,
health, and other classes.

Research has shown, Page says, that
if the first relationship kids have with a police officer is positive, then
kids tend to have a positive view of law enforcement "the rest of their lives."